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1 − Printing System Overview
This chapter provides an overview of how the Common UNIX Printing System works.
The Printing Problem
For years the printing problem has plagued UNIX. Unlike Microsoft® Windows® or Mac OS, UNIX has no
standard interface or system in place for supporting printers. Among the solutions currently available, the
Berkeley and System V printing systems are the most prevalent.
These printing systems support line printers (text only) or PostScript printers (text and graphics), and with
some coaxing they can be made to support a full range of printers and file formats. However, because each
varient of the UNIX operating system uses a different printing system than the next developing printer drivers
for a wide range of printers and operating systems is extremely difficult. That combined with the limited
volume of customers for each UNIX varient has forced most printer vendors to give up supporting UNIX
entirely.
CUPS is designed to eliminate the printing problem. One common printing system can be used by all UNIX
varients to support the printing needs of users. Printer vendors can use its modular filter interface to develop a
single driver program that supports a wide range of file formats with little or no effort. Since CUPS provides
both the System V and Berkeley printing commands, users (and applications) can reap the benefits of this new
technology with no changes.
1 − Printing System Overview
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